A Woman Says She Flushed Her "Emotional Support" Hamster Down the Toilet Because Airline Staff Told Her To

A woman is under fire after news reports went viral of her flushing her "emotional support" hamster down the toilet before getting on a flight.

According to the Miami Herald, 21-year-old Belen Aldecosea had booked a Spirit Airlines flight from Philadelphia to Florida with her hamster, named Pebbles, back in November. Belen had gotten Pebbles last year, after she developed a painful growth on her neck that she thought was cancerous. Although the growth turned out to be benign, she was flying home in the hopes that it would be surgically removed. Belen says she called Spirit beforehand to make sure she could bring Pebbles onboard, and checked in with paperwork proving the hamster was an "emotional support" animal. However, while she was on her way to security, an employee told her Pebbles wouldn't be allowed onboard or in the cargo hold. The airline then offered to book her on a later flight, which she accepted, but she was unable to get anyone to pick Pebbles up, was too young to rent a car, and was unwilling to travel via Greyhound bus, which would take days.

That's when, Belen claims, a Spirit told her she could either set the hamster free or flush it on the toilet. She chose the latter, telling the Miami Herald that it would be more humane to kill Pebbles immediately rather than letting her freeze outside or get hit by a car.

“She was scared. I was scared. It was horrifying trying to put her in the toilet,” Belen told the paper. “I was emotional. I was crying. I sat there for a good 10 minutes crying in the stall.”

According to the Herald, she is now considering filing a lawsuit against Spirit. Meanwhile, the airline admits through a spokesperson that an employee did incorrectly initially tell her the hamster was allowed onboard, but denied that anyone had told Belen to flush Pebbles down the toilet. “To be clear, at no point did any of our agents suggest this guest (or any other for that matter) should flush or otherwise injure an animal,” a spokesman told the paper.

PETA says someone needs to be held accountable for Pebbles's untimely death. “One phone call could have saved this animal, or some kind person at the airport could have helped,” Daphna Nachminovitch, PETA's senior vice president of cruelty investigations, told USA Today. "Flushing a living being down a toilet is not only cruel but also illegal, and both the person who killed this animal and Spirit Airlines — if an employee did, in fact, advise the woman to drown the hamster — should be charged. This must have been a horrific, terrifying death."

Pebbles has since been replaced with another hamster, according to USA Today.